Palms Blush, 2026 by Ray Patrick — original oil painting — 2026.123.063

Subject

Four palms against a sky graded from hot pink at the top to deep blue at the base, their crowns silhouetted and their trunks running the full height.

Composition

Upright. The crowns are set across the top quarter, two of them cropped by the edges, and the trunks drop as near-parallel lines through an empty field. The gradation does all the work below them.

Palette

Rose and coral at the top, through cream and a pale mint band at the centre, into cerulean and cobalt at the base. The palms are a flat blue-black.

Handling

The ground is brushed in broad sweeping passes and the colour blended where the bands meet, with incised marks scratched into the middle register. The crowns are struck in with a loaded brush, their fronds separate quick strokes.

Medium and support

Oil. Flexible unstretched support; thin and smooth, with scored lines and weave legible through the paint.

Signature

Lower right, initials only, small and in dark paint.

From the artist:

I was thinking about the layered sunset against the palm silhouettes. I would squint my eyes to simplify the layers and paint what I saw. I still remember the sand between my toes.